Empoleon or Bibarel for a Stealth Rock, Yawn, Swords Dance and an attacking move strategy?

Question

So, here is a break down on the strategy:

1. Start off with Stealth Rock
2. Use Yawn to put pressure on the opponent.
3. Use Swords Dance assuming the opponent would switch out
   4.Use an attacking move

It's gimmicky, but with Light Screen and Reflect support, you could pull it off. The only evolved Pokemon that can do this is Empoleon and Bibarel. Which of the two would be effective for this strategy?

This is for Gen 7, in the Battle Tree, occasionally online battles too.

Comments

My best pokemon's bibarel

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I mean, technically, if you have a Simple Bibarel, you can get to +4 with one SD.

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ya meme them.

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That's not really the point....

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No double battle. One man shoots simple beam at other poke. Then you swords dance

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No one uses SR in doubles, there's basically no switching.

Answer 1

Neither

While this strategy would in theory work for the first few battles, as the AI gets tougher and you face online opponents who know what they're doing, you'll start running into problems.

The reason for this is simple (no pun intended), it's that neither of those Pokemon can boast the firepower or coverage to make it work consistently. And it's too many "roles" (sleep, set up would take up 2 slots, and wasting another slot on Stealth Rock isn't necessarily the most efficient way of going about your strategy).

A better idea would be to have a dedicated lead for Stealth Rock + Dual Screens (Azelf comes to mind) along with Memento/Explosion/U-turn to keep the momentum in your favour.

Yawn + Set-up + Attacks would be pretty effective after your lead Pokemon faints/ is switched out, so that's something you can consider. But again, Empoleon and Bibarel are too slow to reliably continue to sweep (for the amount of set up you have) before being revenge killed. There's plenty of other Pokemon which can be used, so you could search for something that catches your eye.

tl;dr Stealth Rock only takes up an extra slot that makes Swords Dance have 1 less attack to use. You're better off using a dedicated lead and another Pokemon with better stats can set-up sweep later.

Answer 2

I would go with Bibarel on this one. What makes Bibarel a better choice here is its ability Simple. Your strategy is based off of switching out to get an Attack Boost. With Simple, Swords Dance gives you not a 2x Attack Boost, but a 3x Attack Boost. There is a 1 stat difference between Bibarel and Empoleon with 85 and 86 respectively, so barely any difference to be noted. Both have access to Aqua Jet for Priority STAB, so Speed is negligible to note. However, if you plan to not use Aqua Jet, Bibarel has 71 Speed compared to 60 for Empoleon. Empoleon does have much better bulk which suits this strategies set-up time, but I still believe Bibarel is the better option due to its ability, Simple. So, Bibarel will need a little prediction to help with its lower bulk, but I still believe it is the better option.